Why content management is king in digital strategy

Cindy Baker

2 weeks ago

Many organizations are drowning in digital content, but those who manage to swim will have a competitive edge in the future.

“How we collaborate and manage information is at the centre of digital transformation,” said Ian Phillpot, vice president of Box Canada at a recent ITWC webinar. “Nowadays, people want access to information anywhere, anytime and on any device.”

Content is comprised of an organization’s data as well as documents, images and video. It’s a valuable asset, but it’s also difficult to manage.

Large organizations have hundreds of content repositories, said Phillpot. Content management in the cloud enables them to seamlessly leverage the power of their information, he added.

Is content clutter holding you back?
As organizations rushed to adapt to the fast changing flows of information, they’ve ended up with fragmented content systems that aren’t flexible. “It’s easy to get lost in content sprawl,” said Phillpot. “And legacy systems are holding us back.”

IT teams are mired in trying to support the spider web of legacy solutions. They want to innovate, but spend most of their time keeping the lights on, said Phillpot.

Employees expect a digital workplace with the ability to share with other people, both internal and external to the organization. However, 60 per cent of workers say that collaboration tools from IT aren’t that useful, said Phillpot.

Employees want to get work done faster and will use unsanctioned tools to do it. Seventy-six per cent of employees think it’s acceptable to move confidential documents to personal devices. “When people have difficulty collaborating, they will also get around the problem by emailing documents, which is the biggest security risk you have,” said Phillpot.

Mobility has become a “big thing” and people expect to use their content on their phone, Phillpot said. Yet, 93 per cent of organizations don’t have support for mobile workflow.

Finally, organizations need better ways to keep up with constantly changing compliance regulations. For example, Europe’s new General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR), which gives citizens greater rights to protect their personal data, will soon be in effect.

How to take control of your content
To compete in the digital era, organizations will need a modern system that manages content in the cloud, like Box, said Phillpot. Box is a single software platform that houses all of an organization’s content in one place for easy archiving, search and retrieval. The platform includes image recognition that automatically detects objects, people and text in images and indexes them as metadata. That means employees no longer have to lose time searching for content, said Phillpot. With the use of APIs, it can also pull content from other tools, such as Salesforce, under the same umbrella.

Having all of the information on a single platform provides two major benefits, said Phillpot.

First, it is easier to secure with multiple layers of defence. Content on the system is encrypted and, with Keysafe, the organization can hold the encryption keys as added protection. Box also has controls to protect employees from security lapses by warning them if, for example, they are attaching a sensitive document to an email. Comprehensive audit trails make it easier to meet compliance requirements.

Secondly, with one centralized system, organizations can apply artificial intelligence to get more insights and value out of their content, said Phillpot.

“Box powers digital transformation by enabling employees to do what they need to do,” said Phillpot. “It makes collaboration simple and secure.”